


conversation in your head

by lamphouse



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: Accidental Kissing, Bittersweet Ending, First Kiss, High School, M/M, Making Out, Melancholy, gratuitous song namedropping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-11-04 00:56:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17888492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lamphouse/pseuds/lamphouse
Summary: Dennis Reynolds is not a burnout. He's not. He just hangs out with some people who may, possibly, be characterized as such—but they're not even really his friends, alright? He's not a loser.





	conversation in your head

Let the record show that Dennis Reynolds is not a burnout. First of all, he dresses _way_ too nicely for that, and also just because he spends a substantial amount of time under the bleachers with the shittiest drug dealer in the school and his friends who definitely eat bugs doesn't mean he's one of them. He doesn't stoop to their level, and he's still on track to be the coolest guy in school come graduation—he just wants a cigarette hookup other than stealing from his mother's purse and blaming it on the maid, which is unreliable and also has started to make him feel really guilty. Anyway, that's the only reason he ever hangs out with these guys, the only reason he could probably find his way to this exact spot at the farthest end of the football field in his literal sleep.

However: just because they're not his friends doesn't mean he isn't pissed off when he shows up and they're not already all waiting for him.

"Where is everybody?"

Dennis was under the impression (read: totally knew for certain, but playing it cool) that they were all going to meet up before trying to crash Stacy Corvelli's older brother's party tonight, but the only person there is Mac, leaning against one of the struts of the bleachers next to the threadbare couch someone dragged out there in the late eighties.

When Dennis calls out, Mac looks up from where he'd been lazily picking at a hole in his jeans with a pocketknife. He straightens up weirdly, then slouches unnaturally into what Dennis privately refers to as his James Dean impersonation. (With the leather jacket, it almost works. His hair is still a disaster though.)

"Gone, dude," Mac says. "Charlie and Dooley are trying to jack one of Dooley's dad's delivery trucks, Schmitty actually got invited and 'doesn't want us to jeopardize it', and Psycho Pete is... off somewhere being psycho."

Dennis couldn't give less of a shit about half the people Mac just listed off, but he cares about not looking like a friendless loser, and hiding under the bleachers just the two of them with nothing to do has friendless loser written all over it.

Before he can start to tirade, though, Mac gestures to the headphones hanging around Dennis's neck and continues, "What're you listening to?"

"What—" He starts way more angry than the question calls for, then starts winding up the cord like he's not still a little pissed. "The Cure."

"Cure to what?"

"The band, Mac, the Cure." Mac squints. "Do you not know the Cure?"

Mac rolls his eyes like he knew the whole time even though he still doesn't. "Whatever."

Dennis tosses his messenger bag on the couch and perches on the arm next to Mac. The thing is actually pretty decent, mostly because Mac yells at Charlie every time the dude so much as tries to breathe near it while covered in mud or slime or whatever he's gotten into.

"Seriously, dude, you ever turn on a radio?"

"I know how to—! Shut up!"

Mac's anger is always good for some easy entertainment, but it doesn't hold today. Dennis has been in a weird mood all week—all month, he blames the weather, April sucks—and he really needed tonight. Even if the plan failed, Mac and his weird friends ( _his_ weird friends, not Dennis's) were always able to come up with some last minute crazy shit that at least would take Dennis's mind off whatever he was subconsciously worried about.

"We can still go to the party if you want," Mac says after he calms down more quickly than is probably healthy. "I know you were looking forward to it."

"Whatever, it's fine." Dennis kicks some rocks. There's always a bunch of rocks around. He's pretty sure it's Charlie's fault. Kid's obsessed with rocks.

"You sure? You've been kind of weird lately."

That gets Dennis's attention. "What the hell do you mean 'weird'? Have you met your friends?"

"They're your friends too," Mac points out, "but no, I mean... You've just been spacey lately, and skittish."

"What?"

Mac sits up, getting more animated the longer Dennis doesn't tell him to shut up. "Like, you're usually either fine or yelling at everybody, but recently you've been, like, spaced out all the time, like you're not really in there, and flinching whenever someone says your name, and disappearing when we're supposed to hang out. That kinda stuff."

The part of Dennis that isn't freaking out is impressed by how observant Mac suddenly is, but it is a small and quiet part. It's mostly freaking out in his head right now—because he's right, Dennis has been weird. He just thought he was hiding it better.

He's so busy trying to suppress the sirens in his head that all he can say is, "I showed up today, didn't I? I'm not the one who flaked."

Mac waves it off. "Sure, this time. Just... dude, are you okay?"

Dennis is about to argue when Mac's whole face shifts and his mind blanks, because Mac looks concerned, Mac looks sympathetic, and it doesn't immediately piss Dennis off like it does when anyone else looks at him like that, because no one has ever looked at him like _that_.

It doesn't look like pity. It just looks like he cares, and Dennis feels like a deer in the headlights.

"It's fine," he says weakly, and Mac's face doesn't change.

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

God, that's worse. Dennis feels himself twitch, shoulder jerking backwards, eyes wide, but he can't help it. Mac must (rightly) take it as a "no" and starts to fiddle around with his knife again when Dennis suddenly stands.

"What?"

"I, uh," Dennis blanches. "I just—"

He sort of twitches again, but this time, before he can think about it, he keeps going and lurches forward to kiss Mac. He misses slightly, landing too high and off to the right for it to be a proper kiss, and he only stays there for half a second, but in that half a second he swears he can feel his body temperature go up at least five degrees. It's an overcast afternoon, they're in the shade, Dennis is wearing a sweater (his favorite one, white with one red stripe and one blue that brings out his eyes, he got dressed up for nothing but he's not even mad anymore), and yet he feels like if you cracked an egg on his skin it would burn immediately.

Mac, meanwhile, says nothing for several seconds, eyes just as wide as Dennis knows his must be.

"What—"

"I just—"

"Did you—"

"Thanks."

That shuts them both up real fast. Dennis knows they must both look like total idiots, but he's secretly really glad Mac doesn't ask what he's being thanked for because Dennis honestly doesn't know. They're still standing there, staring dumbly at each other, when something changes and they're reaching for each other simultaneously.

Dennis shuts his eyes last, imprinting that last glimpse of Mac's look of concentration, too close to really make anything out. He doesn't know how it happens, but he hears his bag get pushed to the ground, feels the worst of the shitty springs in the couch dig in right under his shoulder, feels Mac's cool leather jacket slip away under his hands and then Mac's slightly warmer hands through his shirt, under his sweater.

He can smell Mac's inordinate amount of hair gel, and behind that rain, and even further back faded shitty cologne and sweat. Part of him steps outside his body for a second to wonder if Mac is noticing all the same things, what Dennis smells like.

All of that stops when one of Mac's hands slides into his hair, at which point Dennis surrenders any critical thought other than how to make this last forever. He doesn't move other than to kiss Mac, afraid that changing the situation in even the smallest way might make it all evaporate, but his hands find their way to Mac's side, the back of his neck, both incredibly warm.

When Mac pulls back just enough to trail kisses across Dennis's cheek and down his neck, he feels like he's been set adrift. As a kid, Dennis used to have nightmares where he'd wake up and his bet would be in the middle of a huge, dark ocean, and it feels like that, except: Now the sky is light, and Mac is so very warm, and the raft he's on isn't lonely anymore.

Dennis is just starting to reach out again, fingers previously just uselessly caught in Mac's belt loops now pulling him in closer, always closer, when one of them moans.

It isn't until Mac has scrambled back up against the opposite arm of the couch that Dennis realizes until then it had been quiet. It isn't until a breeze comes through and freezes the sweat on the back of his neck that he realizes it was him.

Still neither of them says anything, although Mac's heavy breathing has gotten louder with each shallow inhale. This time Dennis wishes he had closed his eyes first, but he can't anymore; they feel like they're stapled open. Part of him is hoping Mac will open his eyes again and see all the things Dennis is trying to tell him in his head. A larger part of him is a coward, and lies back down.

Dennis spends a second staring up at the slats of the bleachers above them. He can't see it lying down, but he knows that right above his head, a bit to the right, are his, Mac's, and Charlie's names scratched into the metal. At the time he'd convinced himself that vandalism is cool regardless of social status, that it didn't mean anything that they'd all crammed their names in there together, but now he's not so sure. The letters are too thin to see except from at the exact right angle, but if you run your fingers over them, you can feel all the little edges nip at your skin. No one knows they're there but them.

When Dennis sits up, he distinctly doesn't look anywhere near Mac. It's hard, seeing as they're still both on the couch, but he doesn't.

After a while, Mac nods at Dennis's abandoned bag and says suddenly, "Isn't that that goth band?"

"What?"

"The Cure. Aren't they those emo bitches with all the eyeliner?"

"Don't be reductive, it's artistry."

"Whatever you say, dude."

"'Lovesong' is a masterpiece."

"Sure." Mac takes back the joint. "What else have you got?"

"Uh..." Dennis leans over to grab his stuff, trying not to notice Mac's eyes on him. " _Purple Rain_ , a Bowie mix, Mariah Carey but Dee stole it and left the empty case like the absolute bitch she is."

"Do you have anything that isn't gay?"

He says it so blankly and offhand, without a trace of either irony or spite, that Dennis isn't even mad. He's just tired.

"This one's got Nirvana."

Mac nods sagely and makes grabby hands at the headphones. "Acceptable."

Dennis scoffs but still hands them over, not even complaining when Mac starts bending the wire headband. "High praise from the guy who exclusively listens to ska and the same two Beastie Boys songs over and over."

Even as Mac punches Dennis in the shoulder he leans in so they can both listen, ear to ear, as the tape squeals forward to the right track.

**Author's Note:**

> gotta love that midterm stress writing fic mood huh! I literally started writing this this afternoon
> 
> despite the fact that there are like fifteen songs mentioned in this fic, the title (and tbh major inspiration) comes from "[party police](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVxID95Ve3I)" by alvvays. I legitimately listened to it twenty times while writing this (which, again, was all this afternoon), and that's not even counting when I started crying too hard and had to start it over
> 
> tumblr @[lamphous](http://lamphous.tumblr.com) and @[sensitiveintellectualtype](http://sensitiveintellectualtype.tumblr.com/) (sunny sideblog)


End file.
